Rebuilding Tactical Airlift: How Airvolve Plans to Replace the Battlefield Helicopter

In Ukraine, fewer than 100 medevac missions have been recorded using helicopters, a staggering drop compared to the Vietnam War, where thousands flew daily.

Airvolve founder Donatas Gendvilas says the reason is simple: helicopters are too expensive to operate and too easy to shoot down.

His answer? A radically cheaper, container-sized VTOL aircraft built for the modern battlefield and designed to bring back life-saving airlift operations where they’re most needed.

In this episode of Defense Disruptors, we sit down with Gendvilas, founder of the Lithuanian startup, to talk about the future of airborne logistics and what it takes to rebuild tactical airlift from scratch.

Read the full episode on NextGen Defense: Defense Disruptors: Airvolve and the Quest for a New Kind of Helicopter